Contents

Official Bio

Vanellope von Schweetz: Hard Candy

"Known as "The Glitch", Vanellope is a pixelating programming mistake in the candy-coated cart-racing game, Sugar Rush. With a racer's spirit embedded in her coding, Vanellope is determined to earn her place in the starting lineup amongst the other racers. Only problem: The other racers don't want her or her glitching in the game. Years of rejection had left Vanellope with a wicked sense of humor and a razor-sharp tongue. However, somewhere beneath that hard shell is a sweet center just waiting to be revealed."

"Diet Cola Mountain is the home of Vanellope von Schweetz, who lives in a secret un-programmed hideaway on the side of the hill. A lifetime of being excluded, bullied and belittled by other racers has made her fiercely independent. She's been teased and troubled for so long, she's given up trying to build relationships with the people she meets. For Vanellope, there's no such thing as friends- just strangers she hasn't met yet."

Appearance

Vanellope is a young girl with fair skin, rosy cheeks and hazel eyes. Her hair is black and pulled back into a ponytail; it's decorated with a various assortment of small candies, and the scrunchie appears to be made of red licorice. She wears a light mint-green hoodie with strawberry bootlace tassels, and two Reese's Cup wrappers for a skirt. Her mismatched leggings are striped with teal and white, and the left is additionally accented with purple "double stripes". She also wears black boots with red frosting scribbles on the soles.

Personality

Vanellope's glitch

Vanellope is a mischievous and quirky 9-year-old (or 12 year old, according to John Lasseter) racer that is full of curiosity. Because of her status as Sugar Rush's glitch, she is an outcast. She lives alone on the inside of Diet Cola Mountain, isolated from the other Sugar Rush racers. The denizens of her game won't let her race, even though she is determined to become a real racer. Due to a rule from King Candy that states that no glitches may enter the race, they believe their game will be rendered unplayable if she is allowed to race.

Sadly, years of bullying had left Vanellope with a sour outlook on life and people, meaning she was often prone to heavy insulting, sassy, and sarcastic remarks. Luckily, Vanellope was able to see the goodness in people through the friendship of Wreck-It Ralph. Though she was often bullied by the game's other young racers, Vanellope was apparently more than happy to attempt making amends, referring to the others as her "fellow racers". This shows that Vanellope is a very forgiving person. This is also seen during the scene where Ralph reunites with Vanellope after destroying her kart. It took no time at all for the young girl to forgive Ralph after the bad-guy admitted he was wrong for what he did. Another example is when Vanellope regains her throne and gladly accepts the citizens of Sugar Rush's apology for tormenting the girl once their memories of her rule were restored.

Vanellope is also incredibly determined, strong-willed, and very loving. Even after fifteen years of torment and being told she could never race, the young girl always took the chance to live her dream should a chance come her way. Vanellope's loving ways are best expressed in the scene where Sugar Rush was invaded by Cy-Bugs, yet Vanellope was the only citizen unable to escape. Here, she calmly tells Ralph to go on without her, completely accepting the fact that she was about to die. However, Ralph's safety was far more important than her own in her eyes, as the bad-guy was the only person to ever show her kindness at that point, which meant the world to her. When Wreck-It Ralph caused a volcanic eruption to save Sugar Rush (and by extension Vanellope), she quickly used her glitching powers to rescue him in return.

Another example is displayed when Vanellope gives Ralph a gift for helping her create a real racing kart; a homemade medal that reads "You're my hero.", given to the bad-guy in case she didn't win his original hero's medal back at the end of the Random Roster Race, knowing how much earning a medal meant to him.

She also has a twisted sense of humor, notably shown when she kidded the racers into thinking she was going to have them executed.

She declined to be referred to as a “princess”, due to developing a feisty attitude, opting instead to be called a president “for democracy’s sake".

Development

Watch it, rookie!

This article may contain spoilers. Read at your own discretion!

When the viewer first encounters her, Vanellope is in a tree in the candy tree forest when she encounters Wreck-It Ralph and strikes up a conversation with him. However, Vanellope notices a "gold coin" atop the tree, becoming excited and dashing toward it, ignoring Ralph, who confesses that he is from a different game and needs the medal that she has mistaken for a gold coin. After "winning" the coin from Ralph, Vanellope runs off to the race track, where the racers of Sugar Rush are preparing to pay a gold coin each to race in the Random Roster Race, a daily race that determines which racers will be featured in the game's roster on the following day. Vanellope disguises herself and sneaks into the lineup to insert the medal for her coin, putting herself in the race officially.

Unfortunately, Vanellope is considered a glitch, and glitches aren't allowed to race by orders of the Sugar Rush ruler, King Candy. When he notices her attempting to race, he orders his security guards, Wynnchel and Duncan, to arrest her, but then Ralph (covered in taffy and other candy) arrives to reclaim his medal. The scene that follows distracts the king and his guards, allowing Vanellope to escape, and she heads to the junkyard with her homemade kart. Vanellope is then confronted by Taffyta Muttonfudge, Candlehead, Rancis Fluggerbutter and the other racers. They torment the girl, calling her "an accident waiting to happen", and destroy her kart to prevent her from racing.

Ralph witnesses the bullying and sympathizes with Vanellope after the kids toss her into the mud; he charges out of hiding and scares the kids away. Vanellope is upset and embarrassed and snaps at Ralph, who reacts badly and calls Vanellope a thief for stealing his medal. Vanellope explains that she will return the medal the moment she wins the race, but without a kart, both she and Ralph are out of luck.

In anger, Ralph begins to wreck things, including a jawbreaker, something that is rock-solid. Witnessing Ralph's strength gives Vanellope an idea to have him break her into the kart factory in order to make a real kart. She convinces Ralph to help her by telling him that once she wins the race (the prize for which is the pot of coins), she'll return the medal. Ralph reluctantly agrees and the duo sneak into the factory. There, they build the kart together and bond during the chaos, while Ralph is amazed when he discovers that he can create as well as destroy. Because of how Ralph has mishandled the decorating part, though, the kart appears very different from what it's supposed to look like. Disappointed, Ralph apologizes for messing up, but Vanellope is happy to have a real kart in her possession. To finish their newfound "masterpiece", Vanellope and Ralph sign the kart.

Just then, King Candy arrives with officers and attempts to capture Ralph and Vanellope. The two try to drive away, but Vanellope doesn't know how to drive a real kart. Ralph instead gets the kart going and steers it by hand. King Candy, Wynchel, and Duncan are in hot pursuit until Vanellope glitches herself and Ralph into Diet Cola Mountain, where she secretly resides. Inside, Vanellope shows Ralph her home and explains that because she is a glitch, she's tormented by everyone in the game and can't leave the game and escape her tormentors because glitches lack the ability to do so. She figures that if she wins the race, the others would stop treating her harshly and make amends. Ralph feels badly for the young girl and decides to build a track in the mountain so Vanellope can learn how to drive in the Sugar Rush race.

Vanellope learns quickly, and they eventually head out for the race, but not before Vanellope runs back into the mountain to get something. During her absence, King Candy shows up to return Ralph's medal. King Candy then tells Ralph that he mustn't let Vanellope race, because if she gets onto the game's roster, the players will notice her glitching and think the game is broken, causing the game to be considered out of order and unplugged, with Vanellope (as a glitch) unable to escape, being left inside the game to die. King Candy leaves Ralph with these heavy thoughts. When Vanellope returns, she gives Ralph a medal she made just in case they didn't win. Ralph is thankful, but he tells Vanellope that racing might not be the best thing for her. Confused at Ralph's change of heart, Vanellope asks why, and Ralph tells her that he has been talking to King Candy.

Before he can explain further, Vanellope notices the medal around his neck and thinks he has ratted her out in exchange for it, and the two begin to argue. Vanellope decides to race without Ralph's help, but Ralph, refusing to risk Vanellope's safety, destroys the kart. Vanellope tries to stop Ralph, but to no avail, as her kart has been destroyed, along with her dreams of winning the race and getting a better life. Vanellope says to Ralph, sobbing, "You really are a bad guy," and runs off in tears, and the downhearted Ralph returns to his game. After Ralph's departure, King Candy captures Vanellope and imprisons her in his fungeon. Meanwhile, Ralph, returning to his own game and finding it abandoned in preparation for unplugging, throws his medal at the glass of the cabinet, which dislodges the "out of order" sign and lets him see the side of the Sugar Rush cabinet, on which an image of Vanellope is featured prominently.

Going back into Sugar Rush, Ralph interrogates King Candy's assistant, Sour Bill, to find out why this is. He learns that she was a legitimate character in the game, but King Candy hacked the coding of the game to remove her and all memory of her previous status, causing her glitchiness, and having her cross the finish line in an official race would reset the game, undoing the damage and restoring the original coding. Ralph takes the pieces of the kart and goes to the fungeon to rescue Fix-It Felix, Jr., whom he begs to fix the kart. Felix at first refuses, but after Ralph promises to never try to be good again, Felix finally agrees and repairs the broken kart. Ralph breaks into Vanellope's cell and rolls in her kart, now repaired, as he apologizes to her. The three rush to the Random Roster Race, which has already begun. Ralph instructs her to just cross the finish line to be a real racer as she doesn't have to win, but Vanellope, proclaiming herself to be real racer already, is determined to win the race.

Vanellope manages to get into second place, behind King Candy, who tries to destroy her kart by ramming into it. As King Candy attacks her, Vanellope begins to glitch nervously, causing the king to glitch as well. King Candy is revealed to be Turbo, a character from an old racing game called Turbo Time who was supposedly killed when his game was unplugged but has taken over Sugar Rush as King Candy. The evil racer tries to murder Vanellope by ramming her into an oncoming stalagmite. Vanellope is able to escape her death by glitching out of Turbo's grasp, and she heads for the finish line. Suddenly, a swarm of Cy-Bugs from the game Hero's Duty, which have been breeding in the catacombs underneath Sugar Rush, explode from the sides of the track.

Vanellope's kart is caught in the explosion, prompting Ralph and Felix to come to her rescue as Cy-Bugs destroy the finish line. Sergeant Calhoun, the lead character in Hero's Duty, orders the citizens of the game to evacuate. Ralph also tries to evacuate Vanellope, but Vanellope, still being a glitch, is unable to escape. Despite this, she accepts her oncoming death and tells Ralph to go without her, but Ralph refuses to leave her to die and desperately thinks of a way to save Sugar Rush. Ralph then overhears Calhoun telling Felix that the bugs can't be stopped without a beacon and quickly comes up with an idea to erupt Diet Cola Mountain, hoping to have the erupting lava act as a beacon. Leaving Vanellope with Felix and Calhoun, Ralph hurries to the top of Diet Cola Mountain and begins to smash the crater of Mentos but is attacked by Turbo (who had transformed into a Cy-Bug after being consumed by one). Vanellope is forced to watch as Turbo flies into the air with Ralph in his grasp.

While this is occurring, a swarm of Cy-Bugs turn their attentions to killing Vanellope, Felix and Calhoun, and Turbo forces Ralph to watch the horrific scene from the air. Ralph is able to break free of Candy's grasp and plummets down to the mountain, intending to sacrifice himself for Vanellope, and brings the whole crater down into the volcano. When Vanellope sees Ralph plummeting, she glitches past the bugs, takes another racer's kart, and glitches into Diet Cola Mountain, where she is able to catch Ralph before he falls into the lava. Together, they escape the volcano just as massive amounts of Mentos plunge into the hot diet cola, causing the mountain to erupt.

The eruption produces a beacon that attracts all the Cy-bugs, including Turbo, vaporizing them for good. After Felix fixes the finish line, Ralph pushes Vanellope's kart, with Vanellope inside, across the line, and the game resets. Vanellope magically transforms into a princess, revealing her to be the rightful ruler of the kingdom. Taffyta, Candlehead, Rancis and the other racers, whose memories have been restored after being locked during Turbo's reign, remember Vanellope's rank as a princess. Horrified about their mean attitude toward her, they apologize to Vanellope, begging for her forgiveness, but Vanellope decrees that everyone who has bullied her to be executed. The racers react in horror and break down in tears about their impending death. However, Vanellope reveals that she's kidding and accepts their apology.

Ralph is surprised to see Vanellope as a princess and thinks that as her real self, but Vanellope glitches out of her princess attire and explains that though the code may say she is a princess, she is really a racer with a greatest superpower: her glitching abilities that she decides to retain, as she feels thankful to have this power that has helped her and Ralph save Sugar Rush. However, she still accepts to lead the kingdom as "President Vanellope von Schweetz".

At this time, the arcade is about to open, and as Ralph prepares to leave Sugar Rush, Vanellope hugs Ralph and offers him a wing in the castle where he will be happy and loved. Ralph turns down the offer and explains that her friendship makes him happy enough and that he needs to play the bad guy in his own game. Ralph and Vanellope bid farewell. The other Sugar Rush racers then surround Vanellope as they reconcile, befriend her, and accept her back into the game.

During the finale, Vanellope, seen in her princess attire, serves as the maid of honor at the wedding of Felix and Calhoun. It's also shown that Vanellope has become a fan-favorite in Sugar Rush. Now that she's able to control her glitching, she uses it to pass by the other racers as a special ability. During the end credits, Vanellope and Ralph, along with Felix and Calhoun, are shown enjoying each other's company and game-jumping into numerous games.

Interactions

When Vanellope first meets Ralph in the first movie, they start off on the wrong foot as Vanellope steals Ralph's medal earned from Hero's Duty and uses it to get into a race. She promises to return it if he helps her win the race since Sugar Rush racers are returned their medals used to enter the race once they finish it. Ralph is obviously peeved by the request as he wants to continue his game-hopping quest, but he does it anyway for the hardship of the medal. Since Vanellope's original kart the Lickety-Split was destroyed by the other racers, she and Ralph have to start from the beginning, breaking into the kart bakery to build a real kart for her to race with.

Ralph and Vanellope really didn't like each other when they first met. They were both the annoyance to one another as things failed between the two. However, Ralph soon learns that Vanellope is much like him as she yearns to play as a racer in her own game, but lives a hard life because of her glitch.

Ralph and Vanellope making their deal

Realizing that she needs a restart on life like he does, they start over as acquaintances to finish her go-kart dream. Ralph wants his medal and Vanellope wants to win a race, so he agrees to help her with her plan. Ralph finds that he and Vanellope have more in common than he initially thought. He realizes that Vanellope lives in a heap of trash (candy wrappers) like him, that she's disliked by many as he is, and that they both want to accomplish goals that will change others' perspectives of them. They bond over the baking of her kart and teaching her how to ride on an unfinished track where she lives.

Vanellope giving Ralph a medal

When King Candy uses the Konami code to retrieve the medal Ralph is after and returns it to him, he tricks him into agreeing to keep Vanellope from racing. When Vanellope refuses to listen to Ralph, he destroys her kart, leaving her heartbroken and saying, "You really are a bad guy." Then Ralph goes back to his own game with the medal. But when he sees her avatar on the side of the game cabinet, he realizes that she was supposed to be in the game and gets Fix-It Felix, Jr. to fix the kart so Vanellope is able to race.

After Vanellope is restored to her original status as a princess and becomes president instead, she and Ralph go game-jumping together after arcade hours. In the introduction to the video game, Ralph states that Vanellope is one of his best friends.

Taffyta is a "popular girl" type and an accomplished racer. At first, Taffyta has a really bad attitude towards Vanellope and she doesn't respect her since she's a glitch. She agrees with King Candy that glitches shouldn't be allowed to race and she looks down on Vanellope, bullying and teasing her to the point of getting the other racers to help her destroy Vanellope's homemade kart so that she couldn't race.

At the end, Taffyta learns to respect Vanellope and becomes her friend, along with the other racers.

Trivia

Vanellope's name literally means "Vanellope from [the city of] Schweetz." Her first name is most likely a combination of the female name Penelope and a flavoring used for sweet foods, vanilla. Her last name contains the German preposition "von," which originally indicated place of origin, but was later also used to indicate royalty. "Schweetz" is likely a play on the word "sweets" and the name "Scwitz". "Vanellope" was likely inspired by another famous animated racer, Penelope Pitstop from Wacky Races.

Before she learns how to control her glitching, Vanellope is shown to glitch more often when excited or worked up.

In the junior novelization, Vanellope describes the fictional disability, pixlexia, as "a code-reading disability that occurs when the corpus does not properly recognize certain symbols." This is a reference to the real-life disability, dyslexia.

She references pixlexia briefly in the movie as well.

Her skirt is made out of a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup's Wrappers.

The "bow" she uses in her hair is actually red licorice.

Her fans are anthropomorphic popcorn.

Vanellope is the only racer in Sugar Rush wearing a hoodie rather than a jacket, and is the only one not to wear a helmet or cap on her head. However, she does sometimes wear her hood up and over hear head.

Vanellope (along with Gloyd) are the only racers on Sugar Rush whose ears are shown, due to the others' helmets or their hairstyles which completely cover their ears. She is also the only one who had her forehead exposed due to the other racers' hair covering their foreheads.

The kart that King Candy has is normally seen in Vanellope's possession, as Vanellope is seen driving it on the side of the game console.

Vanellope is the only main character that never called Ralph by his title 'Wreck-it'.

Vanellope had no memory of being the Princess of Sugar Rush because Turbo locked up the memories of all the racers, including hers. However, some disagree with this due to the fact that in one of the scenes she calls Taffyta and the rest 'fellow racers'. This may be because the scene was soon after Vanellope enters the race using Ralph's medal.

In one of the concept arts she is seen using her original kart and the actual racing attire.

She is one of the only characters who doesn't trust King Candy.

According to Rich Moore and Sarah Silverman, Vanellope is 9 years old. However, according to John Lasseter, she is 12 years old.

However, it is hard to tell, as she could have been inspired by the Chibi style (see below).

Vanellope, along with the other Sugar Rush racers, are partly based on the Chibi style; a style used in anime that depicts characters as small, cute and, at most times, childish.

Some people wonder why Vanellope isn't an official Disney princess, and the reason that she isn't is because she didn't want to be a princess and made herself president of Sugar Rush instead.

Throughout the whole movie, Ralph usually refers to Vanellope as "kid" instead of her real name. He only refers to her as "Vanellope" three times in the whole film.

Despite having hazel eyes in the movie, posters, etc., Vanellope can clearly be seen with bright green eyes when she is shown on the side of the cabinet after Ralph throws away his medal.

Vanellope has central heterochromia, meaning that her eyes have a different color at the center (brown) than towards the edges (green).

Interestingly enough, Vanellope is never shown racing in her white tracksuit after she resets the game, nor is she seen racing in her original kart, which was stolen by King Candy. It's implied that the kart that she and Ralph created was eventually incorporated into the game and her supposed original (King Candy's) was presumably destroyed when King Candy transformed into a Cy-Bug and was killed.

Vanellope's princess dress resembles the dresses worn by royal women during the 16th-17th century.

Although it is stated that Vanellope is unable to leave her game due to her being a glitch, at the end she can be seen attending Felix and Calhoun's wedding as Calhoun's maid-of-honor. In fact during the credits she can be seen traveling with Ralph, Felix and Calhoun to different video games, this is due to her reintegration after the game reset, leaving her "glitchy" (i.e. capable of teleporting within the game) but no longer a glitch.

She used Crumbelina Di Caramello's kart to save Ralph from plummeting into Diet Cola Hotsprings in Diet Cola Mountain.

When creating Vanellope, animators and designers described her as having "a hint of Sarah (Silverman), a hint of Cindy Lou Who, combined with this grubby little Pippi Longstocking moppet kid."

Originally, Vanellope was going to have grayish-green skin to show viewers that she was a glitch, but her animators eventually decided against it since they thought it would make her look too much like a zombie.

Also, Vanellope is the only character from Sugar Rush to see in person King Candy's real identity as Turbo; however, she does not seem to know anything about Turbo's origin much less recognize him, whereas the majority of the inhabitants of the video game world do, which can be seen in the cases of Wreck-It Ralph and Fix-It Felix, Jr. Thus, it is unknown if Vanellope saw Turbo before he snatched her throne and locked her memories, though another possible theory suggests that Turbo supposedly disappeared years before the Sugar Rush game console was first plugged in at the arcade, explaining the girl's ignorance of the rogue racer.

The real-world Road Blasters game was released in 1979, hence the incident of Turbo invading the in-universe Road Blasters probably happened in 1979 or 1980. Sugar Rush Speedway is known to have been released 15 years before the events of the film (that is, in 1997), so naturally its characters are unlikely to know about Turbo or his game-jumping.

Unlike the other main characters in the film, Vanellope's hands only have four fingers as opposed to five.

In the video game, Vanellope's goggles have a red film over them instead of clear lenses as seen in the first film.

Unlike the other Sugar Rush Racers, Vanellope doesn't have a particular candy theme.

Her first meeting with Wreck-It Ralph shows that she is very courageous; Ralph is something like 3 times her height, and somewhat more than 27 times her weight due to his heavier build, but she's not scared (or doesn't show it).